Astrological Rim
by Martito Broodley
Summary: Space AU. Will contain space Kaiju, space Jaegers, and fake space science.


A screen flared up, illuminating the dark room around it. Newton glared at it a second before realizing he was being recorded. He quickly changed his expression from one of confusion to dramatic anticipation. "The date is 2125, January 17th. Today, I boarded the Pan Pacific Defence Corps' flagship, the Shatterdome." He paused for flare, which gave his roommate enough time to lean in and ruin the moment.

"You call it a flagship, I call it their only ship."

"Shut up Hermann!" Newt wheeled around in his chair and waved the dusty looking man out of frame. Swiveling back, he shot the small camera an exasperated look. "That is my extremely irritating roommate, one Hermann Gottlieb. We are the crew's science division, though I could probably do both our work on my own."

"You know, for a flagship, you'd think they'd have enough rooms that we wouldn't have to bunk together."

Ignoring Hermann, Newt carried on, not taking his eyes off the camera. "The Shatterdome's crew consists of several hundred members, led by captain Pentecost. We have some of the greatest Jaeger pilots onboard, and the strongest Jaegers behind these steel walls. Our goal, to capture and bring back one Kaiju." Another pause and a dramatic smile ruined by a snort from behind him.

"By that he means our mission is to sink the Defence Corps' last ship so the UN can retract funding and invest in more successful solutions to Earth's alien problem."

"Hermann! I said shut up!"

A horn sounded, making Newt jump. A crackle sounded the beginning of a ship-wide announcement.

"_Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the long awaited debarkation of the Shatterdome. As we speak, the final preparations are being made before liftoff, so buckle your seatbelts and kiss Earth goodbye. In the case of an emergency, well, your best bet is to return to your designated seats, strap in, and puff on your oxygen masks. Don't try and find the oxygen masks, they only come out in emergencies, folks. So no tampering or screw loosening, you huffers. Your seats will have made themselves available by now, and if not, please notify your nearest supervisor. Yada yada yada, you know how to strap yourselves in. Please don't get up before the seatbelt sign is switched off, even though we don't really have any way of knowing you're in your seats, and we don't really care. Liftoff is in twenty minutes. Hope you enjoy your flight."_

There was a rustling and the sound of a microphone being handed around before a different voice, one accented with irritation, and a sharper tone.

_"Your cooperation is appreciated. Briefings will take place at 1400 hour in your designated meeting place. Your attendance is mandatory. An inflight manual is available on your room's hub computers, and will answer any of your questions about the facilities available on this flight. If you have any further questions, please direct them to your nearest supervisor. All computers will automatically turn off during launch, so please refrain from using them until after your briefings."_

A click heralded the end of the announcement, and the emergence of the takeoff chairs, which swung out from the wall on the far side of the room. They looked metallic and uncomfortable.

Newton continued to stare at them until he remembered that the camera was still recording.

"Well, now that the announcements are done, I still have about seventeen minutes to tell you about our research so far. I—"

Another honk of the horn and the announcements blared again, this time in Cantonese. From the little Newt knew of Chinese, he could tell the announcement were being made again, in a slightly less sarcastic tone. He cupped his head in his hands and waved at the camera.

"Ugh. Well, _joigin_ for now."

An incensed groan from the bunk off screen was just audible over the bouncy chatter of Cantonese as Newt found his way to the power button.

"It's been one week, and the ship is on constant watch, ever vigilant in the event of a surprise attack. Hermann and I have been working on finding a way to distinguish the resonances in space to determine where the Kaiju are coming from when they appear."

"Will you stop with the bloody video logs?" A sour voice put in from off screen.

"Shut up Hermann. Little success has been made in connecting the source with the sound waves, however. But we remain hopeful." Newt did a twirl onscreen, untangling himself and a chair from a cable he had been holding while talking. "I saw the hold they built for the Kaiju, and I'm still freaking out about it. It's massive! Massive, and awesome! Awesomely massive!"

"Like your vocabulary?"

"Shut up Hermann. Anyways, the ship is cool, but the food is shit. Pardon, crap. They've been serving us some sort of synthetic potato meal you'd only find in the back of convenience stores. Hermann wouldn't touch his at first, but we spiced it up a bit with some hot sauce, and now he's all for it. He won't give me the credit though, not even if I remind him it's _my sauce_. _My sauce I made, and brought all the way here, from home._"

"Yes, and then we inputted it into the food synthesizer and now it's a universal sauce throughout the whole ship. Not _yours_ now, is it? _Yours _is quite a dated idea, Geiszler."

Newton groaned and ducked out of the frame for a second, returning covered in a blue fluid and sniffling.

"Well, now I suppose it's all we can do to wait and poke at the impossible code of the Kaiju."

"February 17th, one month onboard today. No new updates, some advances on our research into the origins of the Kaiju, but we've mostly been studying the Kaiju skin we found snagged on an asteroid. But you've already seen that in the last vlog, so I won't bother you with it. After their discovery, we both had a burst of energy, but we've collected all we were hard-pressed to collect from the sample and the frenzy is fizzling out. It was fun while it lasted. I'm still puttering away on some DNA research, but I can't say it's being very lucrative. Just affirming some of my previous theories."

"Who are you expecting to watch those, anyways?"

"Shut up Hermann. So today, I figured I'd take you on a tour of the hottest spots on the ship. Starting with… the Kaiju hold! Apparently this ship used to be a mining ship, but they converted it to be able to store our supplies and the Kaiju cage in the hold. It's pretty incredible!"

The camera was twisted away from the underside of Newt's chin and towards a captivatingly large area. People were teeming around the cargo bay, moving crates of supplies out of storage, and going about various maintenance duties. In the distance, a colossal Plexiglas cage loomed over the various crates and power loaders. The far side of the hold had been rigged up as a monitoring station, and large windows clearly showed the observation team moving very slowly, occasionally tossing a hacky sack back and forth.

The camera turned hastily back towards Newt, swinging past Hermann on the way.

"Incredible, isn't it? I'm so jazzed about this mission."

"Yes, I can tell it's going to go swimmingly."

"Shut up Hermann. Alright, next, the elevator."

"Honestly?"

"We spend a lot of time in it. I have to show them what it all looks like!"

"Just cut to the cafeteria or something."

"No one asked you to come along."

"If I weren't here you'd be lost within fifteen minutes."

"Untrue."

"Besides, there's nothing to do anyways."

"Um, there's always _something_ Hermann. What with all that math out there."

"And filming to do."

Newt clucked angrily at him.

The pair stepped into one of the elevators, and were doused in a pale blue light. Hermann smacked the panel with his cane before settling into the corner of the pale box. Newt glared at the door for a couple seconds before it opened again, letting out into the cafeteria.

"This is the cafeteria." The camera once again zoomed away from Newt's nostrils and panned the bleak looking and well-populated room.

"It's too loud!" Hermann yelled at Newt, and the camera shook as Newt waved him away like a fly.

"There's not too much variety here in the _natural_ food department, but we've discovered that if you crunch up some of the cereal and get it soggy, it can stick to the pork chops and hey presto! Schnitzel!"

"Come on!" Hermann yelled from inside the elevator, and Newt sighed and stumbled back after him. The elevator clanked back to life, taking a bit longer to reach the next destination.

"This is the mess hall. They have retro VRs here, and some board games over there. The room is on an unofficial schedule. I think the Chinese floor-men have it right now, so I won't show you around. They don't like being filmed."

The next stop was further down, and a little to the left. The elevator doors pulled noiselessly apart again to show a darkened area with pink lighting. Hermann walked past Newt, and Newt grinned at the camera.

"This is our workspace. I know you've seen it before in bits, but I figured I'd give you the grand tour today."

"Just keep out of my area."

"Shut up Hermann. So anyways, this is my station here. As you can see, the samples we picked up—"

Quite suddenly, a siren blared so loud it made Newt drop the camera. Scrambling to retrieve it, a breathy voice spoke quickly and firmly through the ship's speakers.

"_Attention, attention. All ship personnel report to battle stations. All Jaeger pilots, report to the launch bay. A Kaiju signal has been detected on the port side."_

Newt stared around, dumbfounded. His mouth hung open as he registered what he was hearing. "We got one!"

Hermann was stumbling towards him, as quickly as he could manage. "Not yet. Come on, let's get to the safe room."

Hermann hooked Newt's arm and pulled him towards elevator. At the doors, however, Newt gasped, remembering that his hard drive was still attached to his workstation. He pulled away from Hermann, hearing him curse and stumble backwards.

"My research! I can't leave it here!"

"Newton! Get back here!"

Newt shoved his chair away, sending it clattering to the ground and clambered towards his work computer. Fumbling for the cord to his hard drive, the ship spun away from under him, and suddenly he was tumbling down the lab. He saw Hermann's legs buckle as well, and saw him begin to roll down the now slanted lab just as the ship righted itself. The lights, previously pink, shut off, leaving the ship black and groaning before they rebooted in orange, the ship's panic colour.

Newt held his breath, and slowly unhooked his drive while staring at Hermann in horror.  
"Let's get to the safe room." Hermann said, just loud enough for Newt to hear.

"Right." Newt nodded, then jogged towards Hermann. He grabbed Hermann's arm, pulling him up and into the elevator.

Newt smashed his hand against the elevator panel and tucked his hard drive and camera into his pocket.

"What do you think it is? I estimated a category three, but I also estimated it two weeks from now! A level three shouldn't be much trouble for the Jaegers! How is it getting hits on the ship?"

"I don't know, maybe it has a long range weapon or something! It doesn't really matter, does it? It's hitting the ship, which is proof enough that either you're wrong, or that the pilots are losing their touch. This is what safe rooms are for, though."

"You're right. We just need to get to a safe room. Just need to get to a safe room. Just neeeed to get to a safe—why aren't the elevator doors opening?"

The doors had been shut for a great deal longer then they usually were, and Hermann sucked his breath in sharply as he realized this. The two scientists exchanged looks as Newt pressed down hard on the manual open button. The doors snapped open, revealing that the elevator had jammed halfway between floors.

"Shit. Um, what's easier for you?"

"Up. Up. You first, and then take my cane."

Newt scrambled up the ledge, using the rail in the elevator as a foothold. Hermann did the same, much more slowly, and with a hand up. Wobbling to their feet, they peered around their new environment. The hallway was almost black, with minimal illumination coming from the emergency lighting.

"Hermann, where are we? I don't know where we are. Oh my god, oh my god, oh my—"

Another shock threw them down the hallway, bringing them down hard on its steel floor.

"Verdammt. My knee, Jesus Christ." Hermann's voice echoed down the hall, alongside the sound of crumpling steel and blaring alarms.

Newt scrambled to his feet, and stumbled down the tilted hallway towards Hermann.

"Come on, we have to find some stairs or, oh. Jesus, Hermann."

Hermann's knee was bleeding bad, and it looked like something was protruding from beneath the bloody flesh. Hermann had one hand over it, but it wasn't making much of a difference on the blood flow. The other was groping for his cane, which had landed just out of reach. Newt kicked the cane back to him and covered his mouth in discomfort.

"Are you okay to walk? We could make a bandage. Um, yeah, let's do that, I don't really know how, but I… I'll just..." Newt pulled off his overshirt, and began biting at the stitching around the shoulder. Hermann just grunted and moaned. He looked like he was trying his best not to cry.

Ripping the sleeve off the shirt with a steady tugging, Newt bent down to wrap Hermann's leg in the cloth. He nodded at Hermann to let go of his knee, and Hermann grimaced before conceding. There was definitely some bone sticking out, and Newt felt nauseous as he wrapped the sleeve around the leg. The sleeve turned red almost immediately.

The two sat beside each other, heads bent together, breathing heavily as they considered their options.

"Leave me."

"Not happening."

"Listen, that was my good leg. I can't even stand up, let alone get to some stairs and get down them. You need to move. You've wasted a lot of time on me, and now you really need to get to a safe room. I'll be alright."

"No you won't! I'm not leaving you! Besides, the safe room is probably locked by now anyways, so leaving you would be purposeless. We're in this together, okay? Now, come on!"

"No." Hermann moaned as Newt attempted to hoist him up against the wall. He was heavier and bigger then Newt, and his useless legs made steadying him extremely difficult.

Newt ignored Hermann's objections and pushed him against the wall for support. He wrapped one of Hermann's arms around his shoulder and pushed on down the hallway.

After about seven minutes of Hermann's protests and groans, they came to a door. They stood in front of the closed door for a few second before Newt head-butted the door, and it opened. The inside was completely dark.

"What is this place?" Newt mumbled to Hermann, but he only gave a sharp cry, which Newt took for a _I don't give a fuck_. Newt pulled Hermann inside, considering picking him up and carrying him just as they triggered the motion sensors. An abrupt flash illuminated a sturdy looking blue room decorated with lines large white pods. Newt recognized them as stasis pods.

"Stasis? Stasis! This could work, couldn't it? We could get in there, and they could unfreeze us after we're through with this fight!"

"Yes, yes, yes, good idea. Now, come on." Hermann was looking a little gray, and Newt wasn't eager to tell him he had no clue how to use a stasis machine. The stasis pods looked a bit like oval beds, not very tall, but quite round. Round enough for multiple people. Newt dragged Hermann towards one, and fingered the touch screen beside it. A long list of options and mandatory choices popped up, and Newt let out a frustrated gasp. He nudged the screen around for a minute before finding an 'auto' setting. It worried him that it wasn't one of the first selections, but it was enough to get the lid to slide up from the base of the stasis bed, and that was good enough for him. He pushed Hermann inside, groaning with relief. Hermann was beginning to shake with shock, and Newt looked around to see if he had enough time to modify the setting on the stasis. He was shocked to see the stasis door slam shut, silencing the sirens. He took that as a sign that he probably didn't have enough time to do anything.

Newt jumped over Hermann into the pod just as the lid began to close. He stared up at the closing lid, around at the dark cushioned bed, and across at Hermann, who was now weeping silently and trying to look down and away from Newt. Newt stared at him, and his red splotchy face, and he took his hand and squeezed. Hermann's shaking slowed, and he gritted his teeth.

"Hermann, Hermann, it's okay. You're okay. We're gonna be okay man, we're gonna be—"

The explosion could be felt all over of the ship. Brown flames ran up and down the halls and into the safe room as the Kaiju's claws sank deeper into the hull of the Shatterdome, ripping it apart.


End file.
